A HOTEL in Congresbury has been forced to amend a ‘misleading’ promotional poster which cost thousands of pounds - after just one complaint.

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has ruled that a poster at Bristol Airport, stating that DoubleTree by Hilton Cadbury House hotel is 10 minutes away, is false.

ASA watchdogs cracked down on the detail after a complainant from the area challenged whether the advert ‘exaggerated’ the journey time.

Management staff at the club made the journey 10 times and submitted the recorded journey times to the ASA.

They claimed it took from nine to 15 minutes to complete the journey, the average time was approximately 11 minutes, and 10 minutes or less was achieved on half of the journeys.

A spokesman from the ASA said: “The journeys were all early morning or late at night.

“Because we had not seen evidence that the average journey time by road, for the greater part of the day, would be 10 minutes or less, we concluded that the ad was misleading.”

The ASA has now requested that the poster be replaced but general manager at the hotel, Mark Hands, is calling on the authority to either look into a host of other travel claims to the airport, or review its procedures when investigating cases.

Mr Hands said: “The claim that we are not 10 minutes away from Bristol Airport is totally unfounded.

“We have literally been out to make sure that what we are saying is true with 50 per cent of our test runs being under the stated time.

“As far as we are aware the ASA has not visited the area to carry out a similar analysis and has based its judgement on the spurious claims of one individual.

“This case has not only cost us a lot of time but will also mean a hefty bill to replace the poster - and in these times of austerity, it’s a bill we could do without.”